Gonsalves: And the Grinch of the Year Award goes to ...

By Sean Gonsalves

December 27, 2012 - 2:00 AM

Every year around Christmas my octogenarian aunt in Sacramento, Calif., writes a $20 check and mails it to my little brood 3,000 miles cross-country.

Other family elders, living on fixed incomes, also thoughtfully write out small Christmas (and birthday) checks to grandkids, nieces and nephews. It reminds me of the story of the poor widow in the Gospel of Mark who "out of her poverty put in all that she had."

The moral lesson of this Scripture, embodied by more than a few of my elders, is a powerful one that seems lost in the anti-Christ political arguments we hear in modern-day politics. The rich should have their tax rates cut because they pay the lion's share of taxes. And if we do that, the argument goes, the wealth will "trickle down."

Yet Jesus, whose birthday we celebrate this week, says God's moral calculus doesn't measure how much the rich pay "out of their abundance." In fact, he proclaimed, the meager widow's mite is worth exponentially more.

Of course, in the temples of capitalism we call banks, greed — not fairness — is the coin of the realm.

There are hundreds of examples, but one fairly new trend hits close to home, especially in this season of giving: check-cashing fees.

Bank of America, Citizens Bank and TD Banknorth are among the institutions that are now charging "noncustomers" $7 to cash a check. So that $20 check from your aunt is really worth only $13. A $10 check will get you $3!

Bloody thieves, stealing widow-mites!

People deposit their money in a bank and let the banks use the cash for free so they can make money with our money. If I write a check (the book of which I paid for), it tells my bank to give MY money to whomever I say — FOR THE AMOUNT WRITTEN ON THE CHECK! Period.

The banks that charge nonmembers a fee to cash a check say it's because they are providing a "service," as if bank tellers don't exist to provide such a "service," as if tellers are busy doing other stuff and to cash an occasional nonmember check is asking them to go above and beyond the call of duty.

A check-cashing fee is no different from me charging a percentage of what I owe you for the "service" of reaching into my own pocket. If I did that to Joe Six-Pack, I might get punched in the face before Joe reached into my pocket and took all of his money. And no one would feel sorry for me. Many would just chalk it up as karma and say: "Next time, pay the man what you owe."

The law, of course, doesn't allow for that — unless you're a bank. According to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency — the folks who charter, regulate and supervise all national banks and federal savings associations — check-cashing fees are perfectly legal.

That's coming from an organization whose stated goal is to ensure that banks "operate in a safe and sound manner and in compliance with laws requiring fair treatment of their customers and fair access to credit and financial products."

Yet, on its FAQ page, regarding check-cashing fees, the OCC says "there are no limitations on the fee amount. If you think the fee is excessive, you may want to open an account with the bank or cash your check at another institution with a lower fee."

Are you kidding me? Open an account with people who want to rob me? Banks are stealing and the bank cops say: "If you don't like, go someplace else!"

Of course, as this is a growing industrywide trend, at the rate we're going soon we won't have that option in our so-called "free-market" economy. Thankfully, there are a few outliers holding out.

Kathy Banalewicz, retail manager for Webster Bank, told the Boston Business Journal, "we're about relationships and about customer service. Asking (payees) for a thumbprint or fee is not what our mission is about."

Jane Lundquist, vice president of retail banking at Rockland Trust, told the Journal, "we have gained many new business clients who left their prior bank because their employees were being charged to cash their payroll checks."

We should do what Jesus did. In the name of Divine Justice, and on behalf of the widows and the weak everywhere, we should go into our modern temples and flip over a few tables.

In the meantime, I'm giving check-cashing fee banks the Grinch of the Year Award. No, not the Scrooge Award. Ebenezer was just a tightwad. The Grinch was an actual thief, a gangster who took from others because he could.

Wealth doesn't trickle down. Values do. No wonder we have so many small-time gangsters terrorizing the streets. They're mimicking the message embodied by our sneering political and business gangsters: "Hand it over. Excuse me? What are you gonna do about it, punk?"

Maybe I should tell my aunt: Save your mites. Donate to organizations and politicians who will use it to give the Grinch what he's got coming.